Joni Dee · Author · added about 9 years ago

Great job Sharek. Congrets!

Sharek Gadd · Author · added about 9 years ago · 5 likes

Hello All,

Thanks to your gracious support, The Birds Road has been accepted by Inkshares and is moving into editing!

Like a crippled airplane, missing its wings, we careened into the landing zone and safely skidded to a stop just before midnight with 255 orders!

I sincerely appreciate all of you for your efforts. This wouldn’t have happened without you.

I have a large pile of work in front of me; revisions and further editing lay ahead.

If you have any questions or would like to assist in creating The Birds Road, please feel free to contact me.

The Birds Road can still be purchased from Inkshares at the following link. You can also leave feedback and post reviews which further assist me and help promote the book to a wider audience.

https://www.inkshares.com/books/the-birds-road

Thank you,

Sharek Amalek Gadd

Jacob Wilson · Reader · edited about 9 years ago · 1 like

Truly a book that needs to be read! The descriptive writing lays out a picture so well that it takes your mind to the place and time of Sharek’s memory, and conveys such a clarity of genuine emotion that the reader can feel the highs and lows right along with him. Thank you for writing this book, and more importantly thank you for sharing it. Well done!

Sharek Gadd · Author · added about 9 years ago · 1 like

Hello All,

I greatly appreciate all of your support!

I have 11 preorders to sell over the next 44 minutes to make the Quill goal of 250.

If any of you could spare an extra $10 or $20 to make these last few purchases, I will be eternally grateful.

Respectfully,

Sharek

Sharek Gadd · Author · added about 9 years ago · 2 likes

Hello All,

In a few days, your funds will be returned to your account as I don’t believe that I will be able to sell the remaining 130 copies.

I sincerely appreciate your support and am thankful that you considered me sound enough to cast your lot my way.

I have had quite a few people question, if not scold, my decision to not self publish. To answer those queries and counter the derision, I will tell you that I am well aware of being frugal and self sufficient. I have a discerning eye, ear, hands, and mind, but painfully understand my limitations in these waters. I know that I hold a great gem in rough condition and would be a fool to not entrust it to a qualified cutter. I can see the light inside but want someone talented and experienced to assist in setting it free.

Now, if all of you would be interested in doubling your original orders it would be greatly appreciated and would move a seemingly small mountain, but that is in your more than generous hands….over the next 2 days.

I hope you have taken something positive from the parcels my story that I have shared. If you have yet to accumulate any value, I assure you, there is more.

Once again, thank you for your kind gesture and trust.

Sharek Amalek Gadd

Sharek Gadd · Author · added about 9 years ago · 7 likes

Hello All,

I’m not sure if all of you are receiving these updates, so, like a trapped submariner, I will continue to tap my hammer on the cold hull and hope that you will hear my thanks for your support.

I have sixteen days remaining before the door will open or close on this project.

Today, I will post my last entry on the Inkshares site. The events noted in this piece occurred approximately ten years after the last chapter I uploaded. This section is raw but details a twenty-eight hour span that marked my soul and is one of many personal scars I feel I need to share. For some of you, this portion may shine a light on my behaviors that you never understood. For those unfamiliar, I hope you can understand that I was a broken young man.

I experienced many challenging situations as well as the last respirations of my sister Carrie, my brothers, Joe and Danny, and my father, George, before I was twenty-four. These experiences turned me away from paths that people commonly follow and forced me down traces that are questionable.

I understand that most of these events are original to the human condition but in my searches I’ve found few that compare.

I now walk on a road that vanishes in the distance as far behind me as it does in front of me. I often wonder what it would look like without all of those horrid events behind my eyes but I return to the conclusion that the images in my repository are just filters of light and there are as many of one color as the other. The scape is quite beautiful.

I will ask all of you for one further measure of support before this challenge ends. If you are privy to another ear to bend, a heel to kick, or an arm to twist that would garner an addition $10 order, could you do so?

Respectfully,

Sharek Amalek Gadd

Sharek Gadd · Author · added about 9 years ago · 2 likes

Hello All,

My allotted time to gain the required number of pre-orders is quickly waning. By the time you read this, there will be 33 days remaining to sell the remaining 145 copies.

If you like what I have written and if you have appreciated what I have shared, please help me hustle these last few pre-orders.

Once again, I really appreciate and am overwhelmed by the support you have already shown.

I will now remove my Amway hat and plug in the slide projector to share with you the faces behind the memories. -Sharek

Charles and Stella

The Stanger’s

George, Jerra, Carrie, Garna

Daniel

Padanaram

Shelam

Inside our cabin. Jerra, Shelam, and Sharek

Carrie, Lamech, and Sharek

Potters Church

Unck

The Cherokee

Sharek Gadd · Author · added about 9 years ago · 1 like

Hello All,

Just wanted to let you know that I added content to two chapters.

They should be in your inbox and they are on this site.

Thank you for your kind words and support.

Sharek

Sharek Gadd · Author · added over 9 years ago · 1 like

Hello All,

My mother, Jerra K Gadd, will soon shed her memories and the ailments of her seventy four years.

She was confined to a chair beside her fire for the previous six years. While a tenure next to a fire may sound comforting, this internment was not peaceful. Multiple surgeries on her leg that was broken in the commune, a resistant infection, as well as multiple damages to her soul crushed her will to survive like grist in a mill.

She is currently at peace and will hopefully meet her departed loved ones in matter of days.

I hoped to see this project to fruition before her expected death. I also expected more years for her but I now see the folly in my assumptions.

I will continue to post my writings until the clock on InkShares expires but my drive for promoting publication is now spent. When the countdown reaches its end I will notify all of you and your charges will be cancelled.

Thank you for your support.

Sharek

Sharek Gadd · Author · added over 9 years ago · 1 like

Hello All,

Some of you have been asking about the title of my book, so, I’ll tell you of its origin.

When I was a boy, living in Martinsville, my dad took my brothers and I outside to show us the stars. He pointed to various constellations and independent lights while noting their names. He pointed to Orion and regretted not being able to see the Milky Way, but explained that it was the center of our galaxy and that it rested on Orion’s right shoulder.

I still hold that memory quite dearly.

The Milky Way is generally hidden by light pollution unless you’re in places that are still pure. The first time I saw our galaxy was through night vision goggles at Fort Benning, GA.

I was struck by seeing what my father had described. Forty some years passed between standing in the yard with my dad to this point.

Fragments of science, history, and spiritualism managed to remain in my mind through the decades. Since I’ve settled, I’ve garnered an interest in the original religion, which is astronomy, as well as anthropology, and archaeology.

The Milky Way was, and still is, a venerated stellar object in cultures all over the world. It’s been given every name imaginable and is often tied with mythologies concerning the passage of souls to another place.

The stronger side of my genetic makeup hails from northern Europe. In those old dark forests the Milky way is called The Birds Road.

Tie my childhood star-gazing memory to the passage of my family, add a bit of mythology and science, and you have the title of my book.

Food for thought: Physics tells us that we are made of the same material as stars and also, at some point, everything that we are and see we will return to the black hole that stirs at the center of our galaxy.

I’ve added content to Chapter 1. and have added content to the following chapter.

If you like my story, please share this link with those that you know.

Thank you for your support!

Sharek